As is well known, prisms are generally solid blocks of glass or other transparent materials cut to precise shapes and sizes for optical purposes. Since prisms are used for a variety of optical applications, a prism manufacturer will often concurrently produce prisms of various shapes and sizes for different products.
In the manufacture of prisms for binoculars and other products, storage racks are necessary for compact storage of the prisms prior to their final assembly in the product. A large number of prisms may be stored in racks for simultaneous cleaning via ultrasound or with cleaning solvents. An "open" type rack is employed for this purpose, whereupon the prisms are air dried prior to the next assembly step.
Prior art racks are generally designed for storing a prism of a given size and shape. As a result, a number of differently sized racks are necessary to store prisms of different sizes and shapes. The manufacturing and storing all these different racks ultimately consumes a considerable amount of machinist time and money.
Copending U.S. patent application, Ser. No. 08/349,044 entitled "ADJUSTABLE LENS RACK", to Richard E. Feinbloom and assigned to the assignee herein, discloses an adjustable, open-type lens rack. This lens rack employs a pair of lens retaining bars that are movably adjustable with respect to one another. Each retaining bar includes a plurality of channels wherein the lenses are retained. Generally, this rack designates each row for a given lens thickness, since the fixed channels of each retaining bar are designed to accept a lens of a given thickness. This rack, however, is not especially suited for holding prisms which are often concurrently produced in a multitude of various shapes and sizes.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a rack that is especially suited for simultaneously storing prisms of diverse sizes and shapes.